Today in History:

498 Series I Volume XI-II Serial 13 - Peninsular Campaign Part II

Page 498 THE PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN, VA. Chapter XXIII.

than 10,000 prisoners, including officers of rank, 52 pieces of artillery, and upward of 35,000 stands of small-arms were captured. The stores and supplies of every description which fell into our hands were great in amount and value, but small in comparison with those destroyed by the enemy. His losses in battle exceeded our own, as attested by the thousands of dead and wounded left on every field, while his subsequent inaction shows in what condition the survivors reached the protection to which they fled.

The accompanying tables contain the lists of our casualties in the series of engagements.*

Among the dead will be found many whose names will every be associated with the great events in which they all bore so honorable a part. For these, as well as for the names of their no less distinguished surviving comrades, who earned for themselves the high honor of special commendation, where all so well discharged their duty, reference must necessarily be made to the accompanying reports. But I cannot forbear expressing my admiration of the noble qualities displayed, with rare exceptions, by officers and men, under circumstances which demanded the exercise of every soldierly virtue.

To the officers commanding division and brigades belongs the credit for the management of their troops in action. The extent of the fields of battle, the nature of the ground, and the denseness of the forests rendered more than general directions impracticable.

To the officers of my staff I am indebted for constant aid during the entire period. Colonels Chilton and Long, Majors Taylor, Venable, Talcott, and Marshall, and Captain Mason were continuously with me on the field. General Pendleton, chief of artillery; Lieutenant-Colonel Corley, chief quartermaster; Lieutenant-Colonel Cole, chief commissary; Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander, chief ordnance; Surgeon Guild, medical director; Colonel Lay and Lieutenant-Colonel Harvie, inspectors-general, and Lieutenant-Colonel Stevens, chief engineer, attended unceasingly to their several departments.

To the whole medical corps of the army I return my thanks for the care and attention bestowed on the wounded.

Respectfully submitted.

R. E. LEE,

General.

General S. COOPER,

Adjutant and Inspector-General, Richmond, Va.

GENERAL ORDERS,
HDQRS. ARMY OF THE NORTHERN VIRGINIA,


No. 75. June 24, 1862.

I. General Jackson's command will proceed to-morrow from Ashland toward the Slash Church and encamp at some convenient point west of the Central Railroad. Branch's brigade, of A. P. Hill's division, will also to-morrow evening take position on the Chickahominy near Half-Sink. At 3 o'clock Thursday morning, 26th instant, General Jackson will advance on the road leading to Pole Green Church, communicating his march to General Branch, who will immediately cross the Chickahominy and take the road leading to Mechanicsville. As soon as the movements of these columns are discovered, General A. P. Hill, with

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*Report No. 202.

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Page 498 THE PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN, VA. Chapter XXIII.